


post-apocalyptic

by fakeCRfan



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Child Abandonment, Everyone instinctively knows who Jon was during the apocalypse, Gen, Happy Ending Not Promised, Infection, Mass Death, Mob Violence, Plague, Starvation, Use of minor character POV
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-19
Updated: 2020-09-19
Packaged: 2021-03-08 01:34:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,356
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26547610
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fakeCRfan/pseuds/fakeCRfan
Summary: The first complication of the apocalypse coming to an end was a massive wave of deaths.People woke up as though from a nightmare, the haze of terror lifted, the phantoms vanished—but if they had been burning or bleeding out before, then they kept burning and bleeding after.There is no returning to normal, not even after Jonathan Sims has ended the apocalypse Jonah trapped them all in. There is only the painful process of moving forward, and slowly rebuilding all that has been lost.
Relationships: Martin Blackwood/Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist
Comments: 6
Kudos: 50





	post-apocalyptic

**Author's Note:**

> The end of the end of the world comes with a lot of complications.

The first complication of the apocalypse coming to an end was a massive wave of deaths. 

It wasn’t that people had stopped dying during the apocalypse. Quite the opposite, actually. Many people afterward would be able to recall dying three, four times. Some of them up to dozens, in the war zones. It’s just that back then when you died, you came back. It didn’t matter if you were burned alive, or your skull hacked open with an axe—the next thing you knew, you were up again and you didn’t even have time to think about the fact you’d been dead, because the next horror was already there, threatening to split you open again.

Some people called the whole thing “the Great Nightmare,’’ after. It fit the dream-like nature of it all, the lack of any logic or rules of reality. The main difference was that waking from a nightmare meant finding yourself in bed. But waking from this… well.

Hasana got to see it. Lots of different sides of it. Because she was on the ground and because she was in triage. People woke up as though from a nightmare, the haze of terror lifted, the phantoms vanished—but if they had been burning or bleeding out before, then they kept burning and bleeding after. This time, when Hasana felt their pulse go dead, they didn’t come back.

Hasana remembered the moment it all ended. She had treated the same man you see, watched him die around ten or twelve times—a man who had been trapped in a burning tank, covered in burns, skin melted, but still intact enough to scream. When he finally died—really died, going silent forever—the whole tent seemed to go silent with him.

“Ishaan?’’ she had asked, unsure of how she knew the man’s name. He didn’t have dog tags—not this time. But in that moment of silence, suddenly everything clicked, and she remembered all of the times he had died before, sometimes with his dog tags, sometimes able to grit out his name first before bleeding out, sometimes screaming the names of family. “Ishaan, are you with me?’’

Then she looked around. The triage tent, which a heartbeat ago had had bodies piled up and wounded civilians screaming for help at the entrance, now was empty in comparison. Quiet. Most of the wounded in her tent had been illusions, she realized. Just phantoms that only existed to drive her into a further panic. Now, there were only real people around her. Still hurt, still dying—but not in the chaotic clamor from before.

She looked across the battlefield. There weren’t beasts anymore, but sniveling pale boys, every bit as shaky and afraid as her. 

For a moment, there was peace. But only for that moment. Because then, the actual, real deaths started. 

Hasana worked herself to the bone the week after the apocalypse ended. She went from battlefield to battlefield triaging all she could. She had to treat disembowelment, deep pungent infection, burns, amputations—and that was just the first day. The second, the former troops heard screams underneath their feet, and soon they were digging out the victims of another nightmare—deformed, crushed people who still remained somehow alive enough to end up in Hasana’s triage tent. 

That was her life. Day after day, fourteen to sixteen waking hours at a time sorting through mangled bodies, deciding who might be saved, and who had to be left behind. Watching the ones who made it to the tent die anyway. Watching body after body burn on the pile.

The ones that really haunted Hasana, though, were the ones who fell from the sky.

It was a moment she stole for herself, actually. A break. Finally, away from the tent—away from all the blood, infection, and death. Just one moment away from the battlefield. Into the woods, where the trees could momentarily hide the site from her. Just to breathe, after days of watching people die and desperately trying to stem the flow. 

Then, she heard a voice. A man moaning faintly beyond the trees.

“Someone… someone help me,’’ he said. “Is there anyone there? Is there anyone left?’’

Hasana had thought she’d gone completely numb in the past few days, but the voice seemed to re-awakened every nerve in her body, reminding her what fear was.

“Who’s there’’ his voice was ragged, but with a desperate hint of hope. “Martin?’’

“N-no,’’ Hasana managed. “Who…?’’

She saw the man who had spoken. He was leaning against one of the trees, turned away with one arm thrown over his face. It was stupid—of course it was stupid—but he looked like he was in pain, so she took a step forward. Then, she heard a dripping noise and stopped to look up.

There was a mangled body hanging from the tree, blood dripping down. Hasana froze. Then, in a second she heard a crash—something hitting one of the trees in the forest with a sickening thud. She whirled toward the sound, and saw yet another person—their body breaking through several branches before finally being caught in the trees, like a fly in a web. 

“What?!’’ Hasana asked. “What is this?’’

Then, another—this one made it to the ground, limbs twisted and bones sticking out through their skin. Still, she heard a gasp—they were still alive enough to feel it.

“Where are they coming from?’’ she asked.

The man spoke. “It must be the Vast.’’

Hasana turned her head to see the man speaking. He was still turned away from her.

“Some people’s worst fear is falling,’’ the man said. “And so that is where they went during the apocalypse. To fall from the sky.’’

Hasana considered running, but could not move. The familiarity of the man’s voice rooted her in place, while her brain raced to try and remember where she knew it from.

“Of course, the fear was different for all of them,’’ he continued. “For some of them, being high enough up to see the tops of trees or houses was the absolute worse horror. To be that close to the ground ready to crash. So they fell from that height—from exactly at that height at all times. Never stopping still but never getting any closer to the ground. Always _just_ about to crash. Of course, they died immediately after the end.’’

She realized where she had heard the voice before—during the nightmare. An eerie calm sound narrating her worst nightmares as they had unfolded before her.

“For others, it is different. It’s not the moment before a crash they are afraid of. Instead the pinnacle of their fear came from being so high up that trees or houses looked like tiny figures in a child’s game. To look down, and realize with despair how much longer they had to fall. Those… now those took much longer to crash, once the apocalypse proper ended. Days, even.’’

“Who are you?’’ Hasana asked, but the man didn’t really seem to hear her.

“Some,’’ he said. “Some are still falling.’’

Another crash startled her out of her paralysis. She jumped, and ran—but right as she did so, the man turned and uncovered his face.

She knew him.

She didn’t know how, but she knew him. A voice intoning her terrors, bringing them into existence. A face that rose in the back of her mind whenever she had dared to look toward the tower in the distance. An inhuman face, full of eyes that matched the one in the sky. This man—he was a figure of the apocalypse. A figure that she knew, that everyone knew instinctively to be a master in that time, in that place. The man with the eyes. 

But now, she did not see any eyes. Instead, the man’s face was full of holes—eyes plucked out, each gash on his face slowly dripping blood. And he was reaching out.

“No, I’m sorry,’’ he rasped. “Wait—’’ 

Hasana did not stay to listen. She ran, and never went into the woods alone again. 

* * *

~to be continued

**Author's Note:**

> So, I don't think this is how it's gonna be in canon, but in this, the conceit is that Jon managed to end Jonah's apocalypse 1) without dying and 2) without any other major character who are alive as of MAG 179 dying. This means at this time Martin, Basira, Melanie, and Georgie are all alive. 
> 
> Now, this sounds like an ''ideal'' scenario (and it kind of is in terms of preserving main characters), but complications still abound. ''Alive'' does not mean ''having a good time.'' It also doesn't mean ''will stay alive for the rest of the story'' though I also don't have plans to kill anyone off at this time either. Just, I don't have a firm outline in mind so I might decide to kill off characters later. I will update warning tags as necessary.
> 
> I plan to cover how they reversed the apocalypse, where the other characters are, and what they are doing now as I continue this story. 
> 
> With that said, hope you enjoyed!


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